


Attar of Roses

by igraine1419



Category: Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings (Movies), The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-05
Updated: 2013-02-05
Packaged: 2017-11-28 07:22:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/671803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/igraine1419/pseuds/igraine1419
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam bakes an irrisitible cake.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Attar of Roses

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the hobbit_smut "With a Cherry on the Top Challenge".

Sam beats the butter in the bowl, firmly, holding it beneath the crook of his arm, his elbow working away until all that can be heard is the warm slap-slap of the butter against cool pottery, coating and slicking across the cracked glaze. Looking out of the window at the waning light, Sam wonders how long Frodo will sit staring at the far distant hills, seeking the sight of mountains. Soon the migrant birds will be leaving the Shire and the last of the orchard fruit collected in baskets to store in the attics in fragrant rows; and the evening air holds whispers of frost. 

Frodo’s birthday had been a quiet affair, sensitively and carefully arranged so as not to spark any painful memories of last year’s party. Merry, Pippin and Freddy had called by at lunchtime and Frodo had asked for tea in the garden. Sam had arranged a cloth under the apple trees and the four had sat beneath the yellow dappled shade and shared their mathoms. Frodo had laughed and hugged his friends, but to Sam’s eyes he looked lost, as though he was expecting someone who had not yet arrived, his eyes roving restlessly amongst the fading flowers. 

When his friends had gone, Frodo wandered into the kitchen and looked around as if he didn’t recognise it. 

“I’m going to sit on the hill,” he said simply and Sam had nodded and smiled gently, wanting to hold his master and root him in the ground once more, for it seemed to Sam that Mister Frodo had somehow drifted free of the earth. 

Sam beats more slowly now as the butter turns soft and creamy, his mind wandering.

~ ~ ~

The sky had been full of roses that long, drowsy summer. Every time Sam looked up from his weeding amongst the flowerbeds, his eyes seemed bewildered by colour. Brushing the silken heads away from his face, a rain of petals would fall and cover his feet in a scattered carpet of pinks and whites. The rambling roses grew so thick over their arches that the wooden stakes began to bend and uproot themselves from the ground and Sam had to stamp them in with cradles of wood and wire. All pathways were half hidden amongst the shrub roses, stately and upright, yearning towards the sun, their thorny arms outstretched, catching hold of breeches and shirts.

There was so much work to be done, the growth was thick and dense and unrestrained and Sam had inherited the care of it. The responsibility was so recent; it lay heavily on his hands, as he wrestled with thorns and imperious heads that would not bend to his will. As he worked, the air grew warmer and warmer and thicker and thicker with the heavy fragrance that clung to his skin, seeping into his muscles and his bones, until it ran from him in a sweet sweat. As he dug into the moist black soil, burying his hands deep beneath the wriggling roots, into coolness and dark, it throbbed within with a slow, urgent pulse. 

Mister Frodo would sit out in the late afternoons, when the sun had sunk low behind the apple trees and he could sit on the bench beneath the white rose and slip his legs beneath him to read, resting his head against his hand, aimlessly passing his fingers over his lips as his eyes trailed across the page. It was at these times that the fragrance was the strongest and the sweetest, as if all the roses in the garden were sighing all at once. 

The day nearly over, Sam would cast the weeds into the compost heap and push the wheelbarrow over to the wall, the sound of its rusty wheels a harsh music on the breathless air. Slicking back his curls, Sam would pump hard and douse his sticky head with cold water which made him gasp and dispelled a little of the drunkenness that had clung thickly to him throughout the day, like pollen sticking to the legs of honey sodden bees. 

Sighing and stretching out along the seat, Frodo would bid Sam goodnight, and caught up in his hair would be tiny white petals like the garland on the head of the Lithe Queen, and something struck Sam’s heart so deep it rooted there. 

When he returned home his da would check his hands for the green, to see that he had done a full day’s work, and then nod his head approvingly. He couldn’t smell the roses, and he couldn’t hear the thick beating of his son’s awakening heart. Dismissed, Sam would hurry to his room to change his clothes for dinner, shutting out the sound of domestic chatter. Pushing a chair beneath the door handle, he lay down on his little low bed, his body out-flung and spinning like a star, as his hands travelled down his body. Unlacing his breeches, he would slide his hand inside and clutch his burgeoning erection, biting his lip as he stroked himself to full hardness, feeling the heat flooding his skin as his hand moved quickly and roughly, until his back arched off the bed and the breath hitched in his throat on a silent cry. When he came to, his room would be flooded with the scent of roses and the drowsy _coo-coo-coo_ of the wood pigeons slipping through the open window.

~ ~ ~

Golden sugar rains into the butter, to be caught up on the beat of the spoon. Cracking three large white eggs against the side of a bowl, Sam carefully eases them open and, cupping the golden yolk in one translucent shell, slides it back and forth, carefully catching the sticky clear threads in the bowl, until there is no more white to catch.

~ ~ ~

The sun dipped and swung low under the hill, catching in his master’s hair as he walked up to Sam and laid a hand upon his shoulder. Sam was raking the path, dragging up soft shuddering piles of rose petals and, dizzy with their beautiful scent, he looked up and winced at the shining aureole of light that surrounded the ebony curls.

“It’s strange,” Frodo said softly, looking around him in bemusement. “There’s so much abundance.”

Sam blinked slowly and nodded. “Aye, the compost my Gaffer worked in last spring must’ve been strong stuff.”

Frodo kicked his foot against a heap of pale pink petals and watched them settle on his foot. “I wonder if there’s anything that can be done with them – it seems such a waste to see them rot.”

“My sister’s make posies for the linen out of dried petals, but they need only a handful and there’s a good cart-full here…”

Frodo drew a deep breath. “The smell of them,” he spun on his heel and then looked down, his cheeks flushed pink. “It carries into the bedroom at night.”

“It is a sweet smell, ain’t it, Mister Frodo?” Sam replied, raking carefully by his feet, scritch-scritching across the stones as he passed it back and forth, his heart diving to his feet. 

“I’ve known nothing like it – I put it down to you, Sam,” Frodo smiled.

A white petal drifted down and clung stubbornly to Frodo’s foot, and before Sam could stop himself, he had knelt down and plucked it free, his fingers brushing long, elegant toes and the softest darkest curls he had ever touched. He imagined pushing his fingers deep into the silk and entwining them there and for a moment he was transfixed and breathing hard. 

Frodo looked down at him with an intense passive calm, as though he were watching a strange and miraculous metamorphosis unfolding before his eyes. “These flowers never bloomed like this before you started tending them.”

Sam felt a soft hand stroking through his hair, which then passed on like the restless breeze that drew the last breath of intoxication from the flowers, so heavy and sleepy now that they drooped on their stems. 

_If only I could bottle this feeling._

~ ~ ~

Sam’s elbow aches with the beating. The egg whites are thickening and beginning to change from a clear bubbling froth to a thick white paste. With a few more strokes they have formed gentle peaks. Taking a blunt knife, Sam scrapes the whites from the small bowl and combines them with the rest, folding them in deftly and lightly, remembering not to beat too hard or else the cake will fail and the mix be tough as leather. It is the only mathom he has to gift to his master and it has been slow and careful in the planning so he will allow no cock-handed clumsiness to spoil it.

The flour is sifted with the rising powder and the tiniest pinch of salt, and these he adds with careful strokes of his long spoon, until the mixture is golden and thick, pouring a little creamy milk to loosen it and give it a glossy sheen, ‘til it slips off the back of his spoon, easy as batter.

~ ~ ~

Every evening Sam would return to Bag End to water the roses. The sun would slide red behind the hill and the sky was streaked wild with indigo and ochre. All of the smial’s doors and windows stood open to let in the heady fragrance of the exhausted blooms as they shuttered their eyes to sleep, and the air was full of birdsong. Over the hill to the woods and fields beyond, the skylark circled high in the air like a tiny spiralling dart as the last of the day waned to dusk.

At his hip was a cloth bag and as he moved amongst the borders, sprinkling with the heavy cast iron watering can, he would gather petals. He chose only the sweetest and the most perfect flowers and only those that his master favoured to admire with a touch and the low dipping of his head as he moved to inhale. 

These petals then were steeped and soaked and blended and steamed until their very essence was caught and trapped tight in a full bellied jar, which he hid under a work bench in the woodshed beneath a cloth. He would look at it from time to time and watch the misted glass with fascination, as it bubbled and steamed within as if a lethal brew was distilling into fire. 

So many petals for such a little vial. A tiny glass stalk, stoppered with a cap of clay. Within, the essence of roses is captured and distilled to a pale pink drizzle of oil, just half an inch at the bottom, hidden in the palm of his clasped hand, and yet there are enough roses within to bury him up to his knees.

~ ~ ~

The cake mixture stands, creamy and expectant in the bowl, as Sam smiles slowly and slips his hand into a soft cloth bag, reaching for something hidden deep within. Opening his palm, he drops the bruised velvet petals of a dark red rose onto the wooden board he uses for chopping taters. There are still flowers opening under the gentle sunlight and these darkly scented blossoms had been easy to harvest. He had chosen them for their rich musk and the soft velvet slide of their buttery petals. He had wanted to lay them against his lips as soon as he had set eyes on them and knew that they were just waiting to be plucked, ready to fall – a careless breath would have unravelled their loosely furled hearts.

Taking a knife, Sam chops the petals into tiny fragments, staining the wooden board with streaks of red. As they are crushed and sliced by the blade, the power of their scent sends shivers rising up the back of Sam’s neck. Mari had once made a salad of buttercups and he had often chewed on the spicy nasturtiums that grew against the wall, grasses could be chewed, as could the tangy little green weed that sprouted amongst the clover. Roses should be no different, there was no harm in their petals, all their defences grew along their stalks - the petals are intended for seduction. 

In go the rose petals and the toasted almonds, golden brown. A slug of sweet, hot brandy from the high cupboard and Sam stirs in deep concentration, wondering how all will unfold. His heart beats faster, anticipating, sensing the hardness prodding against his thigh as he stirs, watching the flecks of red drowning deep in creamy sweet cake mix. Now – now. Thrusting his hand into his breeches, he slides out the vial and holds it to the light. The pink oil glistens and drips in runnels along the side as he tips it. There isn’t much and it is so precious, he is afraid of wasting a drop as he tugs off the seal and tilts it over the bowl. Two drips fall, then another and another, releasing a strong wave of almost overpowering fragrance – an intense, heavy musk overlaid with a lighter, sharper scent of longing. 

Laying the table with a white cloth, Sam looks out of the window and gazes out over the garden once more. The sun has now dropped low behind the hill and long shadows lie long across the grass. A soft breeze, edged with night chill, flurries in through the open window and a blackbird sings an intricate song from the topmost branches of the apple tree, bubbling with unrestrained joy. 

The cake is rising golden and light and as it bakes, it releases a fragrance so sensual and sweet that Sam’s mouth waters and his hands tremble as he tests the sponge with a light touch of the tips of his fingers, seeking resistance. The cake swells and dips under his hand, drowning his face in a warm wave of delicious steam. 

Whipping the cream, his face pink with exertion, Sam longs to taste the roses on his lips. Biting his bottom lip, he beats in the sugar and then peels open the black vanilla pod, sliding out the seeds within, dark and exotic, sailed in from the distant south and worth a week’s wages at the market. Tiny dark flecks, barely visible to the naked eye and yet so powerfully aromatic, that just a few seeds are enough. Sam uses them sparingly, tucking the rest away in the drawer to infuse sweet custards. Roses, chopped fine, tumble from his hands and are stirred, beaten, thrown into peaks, until they form tiny, shuddering mountains. Sam takes a flat knife and spreads the fragrant cream over the cake in a thick layer, so deep and light, his little finger brushes and catches it carelessly as it levels the surface. Bringing his finger to his lips, he sucks it off, closing his eyes at the beautiful drowsy rose scented cream, when he opens his eyes, the vanilla fills his mouth like an afterthought. 

Arranging the cake on a plate covered in scattered rose petals and carrying it to the table, Sam stands back and waits for the dusk to fall in earnest and bring his master in from the cold.

~ ~ ~

The far hills are veiled now in a purple dusk and dark skimming clouds streak across the surface of the fading sun, as it spills its last onto the borders of the wood, brightening the branches of the trees, before fading to shadow, blue black and flecked with stars.

Frodo shivers a little in his thin shirt and wraps his arms around his chest and knees, his face titled to the sky, watching the round moon floating out from behind the thin cloud, swollen and full and bright – expectant. 

_So the day is over…_

There had been no miracle, no trick of magic or illusion, no reversal of last year’s grand performance; Frodo was still master of Bag End and there was no news of his dear beloved Bilbo. His birthday had been a pleasant enough day, good company in a garden still lush with summer growth, and yet he had been restless, looking over his shoulder countless times, half expecting to be surprised and drawn into a warm  
embrace. ‘You didn’t think I’d be gone for good, did you?’ But it had come to nothing and by the time Merry, Pippin and Freddy had taken their leave and gone their separate ways, Frodo had felt tired and drained to the pit of his stomach. 

Sighing, he lies back on the cool, damp grass, his hands behind his head, moonlight drenching his pale skin. Inhaling deeply, Frodo marvels that the scent of roses can carry so far on the dark air, indeed, it seems that their smell is more intense this night than it has been throughout the long, hot summer. Shifting a little, he closes his eyes and visions began to form unbidden – Sam dousing the sweat from his face at the end of a sticky day, his hands green with the wild growth and his hair tangled with rose petals. Frodo would put his book down and watch and wonder how the gardener’s lad had grown so beautiful, his body stirring hot as he watched Sam shake the petals from his hair. 

Every night upon retiring, with the windows wide open onto the garden, he had spilled himself into his own hand with a cry – imagining Sam’s lips opening under his in blind and yearning love, scorched by the memory of Sam’s fingers on his feet – his body twisting into the damp sheets, trying to breathe in the airless dark. Suddenly he had become intensely aware of the petal-soft feel of his own flesh and the piercing, arching pleasure that could be unsheathed by the movement of his hand upon it. He had blamed it on the roses, accusing them of putting him under a spell, for never before had he looked at Sam in such a way or imagined such strange and forbidden thoughts. In the mornings his bedsheets would hang upon the clothes line, flapping and dancing like great white sails, whispering secrets to the wind. 

Dear Sam, he would be pattering about the smial now, making all ready for the night, lighting the lamps, perhaps lingering a little late, ‘many happy returns’ ready on his eager lips. Sam had smiled so shyly this morning when he had brought the picnic into the garden on a tray. Merry had been telling a noisy tale and Pippin was shrieking and trying to finish it for him, and all had been such disorder, and then Sam had come into the midst of it and gently and quietly set all to rights, passing Pippin a round, sweet apple and Frodo a cup of elderflower cordial, bitter sweet and yellow. Frodo had thanked him and stared longingly a moment, his eyes lingering, momentarily bewildered in counting the many different shades of brown and green in Sam’s hazel eyes, before turning back to Merry with a smile – the sheets snapping and cracking accusingly as his bent his head to drink. 

Sam had lingered a moment on the path, thoughtfully brushing his hand over a full headed red rose, which collapsed under his caress. Holding some of the dancing petals tightly in his fist, he smelled them deeply before moving on up the garden to the kitchen door, his steps slow and stumbling. If it hadn’t been midday, Frodo would have accused Sam of having indulged in one too many pints of ale.

~ ~ ~

Suddenly restless, Frodo clambers to his feet and begins walking down the side of the hill, bats swooping high over his head as he descends, the curve of their wings slicing the air as they wheel towards the enticing moon. As he nears the smial, he walks faster and faster, as though there is something urgent to attend to within that will not wait. Entering the garden by leaping the low hedge, he bolts through the rose bushes, his feet slipping and sliding on petals, breathless, half-moonstruck. Reaching the kitchen door he throws himself through it, laughing, feeling the butterflies rising in his stomach as he backs against the door and stares.

Sam moves away from the table. As he steps back, he looks at Frodo like a startled hare, his eyes unblinking as he pushes his index finger into his mouth. On the table is a magnificent cake, scattered with rose petals and engraved with a rough heart as though it had been drawn with a delving finger. Sam’s hand falls from his mouth and he opens his lips as if to speak, but fails. The air is intoxicating - it is as though all the roses in the garden have woven their way into the smial and taken root. 

As Sam lifts his fingers once more to his mouth and sucks, tasting, Frodo shivers, despite the warmth from the baking. It seems Sam cannot get enough of the taste, for he reaches behind him and swipes a smear of cream off the side of the plate and sucks that too, his eyes wide and shocked. Frodo, beginning to feel rather hot, slides off his jacket.

“That looks good, Sam. What is it?” he asks, moving closer to the table. 

Sam looks flushed in the golden lamplight and there is a long smear of cream beside his mouth. With hardly a thought, Frodo moves closer to Sam and, looking deeply into his eyes, traces it with his finger. 

“Try some, Sir. It’s for you…” Sam whispers, hoarsely. 

“May I?” Frodo tilts his head and moves closer to Sam, so close that Sam could feel Frodo’s breath sweet and hot against his cheek. 

His head swimming with desire, Sam can only nod as Frodo’s mouth hovers over his. Resisting the urge to thrust his face forwards, Sam shudders and sways a little on his feet, as Frodo’s tongue slides along his cheek, catching up the cream and tasting the roses in his own mouth. When he draws back, his eyes are heavily dilated and the blue irises widen dark and full, like ink blots, seeping into parchment. 

“Taste it, Sam.” 

Sam blinks and watches as Frodo cuts a slice of cake and offers it to him. Sam can’t move; his heart is beating frantically and his body is pulsing and throbbing. 

“But, it’s yours Mister Frodo – it’s your birthday present…”

Frodo smiles slowly, “Taste it - please.” 

Sam knows that there is no point arguing with Mister Frodo when he is set on something and, truth be told, he is half-sick with wanting to have another taste of that delicious cake. Taking the cake from Frodo’s hands, he risks a large bite, his eyes drowning deep in infinite depths of darkling blue. 

As Sam chews and swallows, his master seems to visibly flush a pale and excitable pink high on his cheeks and turns away, running restless fingers through disordered curls, as though he didn’t know where to put his hands. 

“Mmmm” Sam murmurs. “Try some sir.”

Frodo shakes his head, his tongue running absently over his bottom lip as if he is mirroring the movements of Sam’s own tongue, as it lingers over the sweet crumbs that cling to his mouth. 

_“More…”_ Frodo says, softly, his eyes unblinking. 

Sam, his mouth watering in anticipation, obediently takes another bite. The cake is light and sweet and melts beautifully on his tongue. When he swallows, what lingers after is the perfume of the roses, rich and dark and unexpected. 

Frodo is leaning against the dresser, his shirt askew, breathing hard, seemingly entranced by the movement of Sam’s mouth. 

Experimentally, Sam takes another mouthful and, nearly choking, watches as Frodo stifles a soft broken sound in the cuff of his sleeve. 

Sam takes another bite – and another. 

Frodo pushes away from the dresser and if Sam had been unsure of his master’s state before, he was in no doubt now. Half unconsciously, Frodo rubs the back of his hand against the bulging front panel of his breeches as he sways towards Sam, his eyes hungry and determined. 

Sam swallows and stills, the half- eaten slice of cake still held within his hand. 

“Ain’t you hungry, Mister Frodo?” he whispers, offering Frodo his piece. 

Frodo hardly looks at it as he opens his mouth and bites down, for his eyes would not be torn away from counting every colour of green and orange and brown. 

_There’s gold there too…_

Frodo pauses a moment, sensing the rose petals dissolving upon his tongue and the cream melting and sliding sweetly down his throat and all the love and desire within it pooling into his belly and turning to flame. 

“What is in this? It tastes…so good…” Frodo sighs, taking another thick smear of cream up onto his finger and sucking ravenously, his cheeks hollowing with shadow. 

Sam watches, enthralled, as Frodo leans over the table, taking deep swipes of the cream with his finger and then sucking it clean, his cheeks veiled with thick dark lashes as his eyes flutter closed. 

“Shall I cut you some more?” Sam asks, taking up the knife. 

Frodo’s eyes open slowly, and he nods, his gaze soft and unfocussed. Sam feels breathless with want as he sinks the knife into the cake for a second time, sliding the slice along the plate, gathering up rose petals as it travels. Frodo grasps Sam’s wrist and lifts it to his mouth. Watching Sam closely, he presses soft lips against the underside of Sam’s wrist, brushing against that place where his pulse beats wildly and moving up until he reaches curled fingers, and with small laps of his tongue, opens up Sam’s palm. 

Sam groans aloud as he feels the cake disappearing off his palm in several quick strokes of his master’s tongue. Soon there is nothing left but what had sunk into the shallow lines of his outstretched palm and these were plundered also until his skin was clean and glistening and his legs were buckling beneath him. Frodo takes one finger between his lips and sucks lightly upon it, his tongue flicking out to brush the tip. 

Sam draws a shuddering breath. “Mister Frodo…”

Frodo lets the wrist go and the finger falls slickly from between his lips. “What do you want, Sam?” 

Stepping forwards, Sam pushes his hands deep into Frodo’s soft hair, grasping it possessively, his eyes seeking recognition and desire. Finding both he braves the reply. “You, Sir,” he says. 

Reaching back with one hand, Frodo catches up some cream and drags it across Sam’s lips. _“Sam…”_ Frodo leans in and lets his mouth just lightly brush against Sam’s and then he draws back, licking his lips before moving in once more and this time, Sam catches him close around his slender waist and holds him there as he plunges with an eager tongue into Frodo’s hot and willing mouth. Frodo moans and grinds his hips up against Sam’s, his body thrilling at the hard length pressed so tightly against his thigh. 

_“Oh my love, my love,”_ Frodo gasps, as their lips slide apart, full and bruised and aching. He runs his hands over Sam’s face. “May I taste you, Sam-love?”

Sam moans softly and parts his legs a little wider in assent. Whispering sweet words, Frodo slowly kneels, unbuttoning Sam’s shirt as he lowers himself to the floor, unveiling golden skin still ruddy from the summer sun and musky with rose. He trails his tongue along it, tracing around dark velvet and lower where a coarse golden thatch meets the panel of his breeches. Unbuttoning first one side and then the other, Frodo presses his lips against Sam’s belly, feeling the fluttering under his tongue as his hands work restlessly over hard throbbing flesh. 

When Frodo takes him in his hand, Sam trembles so hard he nearly lost his footing but Frodo holds him steady at the hips, gentling him with soft, raining kisses over his belly, as his hand strokes lightly, his thumb circling the slick and rosy head. 

“Hush, Sam, it’s all right…” 

Bending his head, Frodo takes Sam between his lips and Sam shoves his fist into his own mouth so that he won’t shout out or curse as the pleasure shoots through his body and bursts up into his head with a piercing wail. Never in his wildest dreams had he imagined this. This shouldn’t be - the master of Bag End on his knees giving pleasure to his gardener. Sam shook his head in disbelief. Hadn’t Mister Frodo called him love? Did he mean love, real love, the same love that swelled in Sam when he watched Frodo twirling his hair as he puzzled over a difficult piece of translation? The same love that entered his heart when he saw Frodo lost and rootless and wanted to bring him home? 

Burying his hands in blissful soft warmth, Sam rocks on his heels and tries desperately not to spill his seed. He is afraid to look down at Frodo, so he focuses instead on the half-eaten cake that stands upon the table, crumbling now and gouged with holes. He had made the heart upon it. He had told himself it was to distract from the smudge his finger had made in the icing as he fiddled with the decoration, but this wasn’t absolutely true. He had meant it, every line and he was pleased with the result, even as his heart had twisted painfully in anticipation and fear every time his eyes fell on it and wondered.

Frodo’s mouth tightens and the pressure is too much for Sam to bear and he cries out as he comes hard, curling his fingers tighter and holding on, his head reeling with the concentric circles of pleasure that spin out and out and out into the warm room. 

When the echoing circles begin to ebb a little, Sam slowly becomes aware of his strong grip on Frodo’s hair and he lets go, shocked, wrapping his arms around his chest as if he means to hide himself away. Frodo looks up and blinks, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. His cheeks are red and his eyes are swimming with bright emotion as he looks at Sam.

“Sam?” Frodo stands, his voice faltering as he moves towards him. “Sam – what have I done?” 

Sam sinks down on a kitchen chair, not trusting his legs to hold him up a moment longer and rests his face on his folded arms, slumped against the table-top. 

“I’m so sorry, I got carried away… I should never have….” Frodo stumbles over his words as he tries to explain the sudden and rather untamed seduction of his most treasured and devoted friend. 

“It’s all right, Mister Frodo. I understand,” Sam sighs. “I felt it too – I think I put too much rose oil in it. It’s strong stuff, I reckon, worse than that fierce stuff that Merry brings with him in the green bottles…”

“How can you ever look me in the face again?” Frodo groans, sinking to his knees beside Sam. 

Sam frowns and lifts his head to look down into his master’s sorrowful face, puzzled. “How can I ever stop lookin’ into your face, ‘tis so full of beauty.”

Frodo seems to shiver and a warm joy settles into his features that melts Sam’s heart. “I meant it you know Sam, I meant what I said.”

Sam reaches out and curls an arm around Frodo, encouraging him to rise, for it seems to Sam that Frodo had spent quite enough time today grovelling at his feet. “I love you too, Sir,” Sam says softly and kisses him slowly and tenderly. 

When they draw apart, Sam notices a small smile quirking Frodo’s lips. “Rose oil, did you say?” 

“Aye, Sir. You said we shouldn’t waste them and I thought it might come in useful.”

“Oh yes?” Frodo asks, mischief twinkling in his eyes as he winds his arms around Sam’s neck and kisses him deeply, his hips dancing playfully against Sam’s unbuttoned breeches, for he is still desperately hard and aching and has not yet found his release. Sam notices and strokes him appreciatively through the soft green velvet, tracing his length and shape with desiring hands as Frodo thrusts up against him. 

“Yes, sir, for massage and the like…” Sam murmurs, suckling softly at the crook of Frodo’s neck.

“Do you, by any chance, have any to hand?” Frodo gasps, tossing back his head. 

Sam pushes his hand into his pocket as he presses hot, open kisses against Frodo’s pale and wanton neck. “Aye,” he pants, feeling his desire rising anew and meeting Frodo’s own. “Here it is – there’s only a little.”

Frodo steps back and looks at Sam from beneath heavy-lidded eyes. “Then we’ll use it well,” he replies, holding out his hand. “Come Sam-love…”

Sam smiles and takes his master’s hand, the vial hot and steamy in his own as if it would shatter at will. Outside the roses droop and sigh as the last of the petals fall and spin softly to the ground.


End file.
